Automated Charging of Electric Vehicles With Conductive Charging Standards

Authors

Dipl.-Ing. B. Walzel, Assoc.Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr. M. Hirz, Dipl.-Ing. H. Brunner, Graz University of Technology

Year

2019

Print Info

Fortschritt-Berichte VDI, Reihe 12, Nr. 811

Summary

Electric-driven vehicles are mainly charged by standardized cable connections today, whereby connection and disconnection are carried out manually. In this context, the automation of charging processes represents an important factor for increasing customer comfort, whereby different technologies are considered. In addition to conductive charging using standardized connections, different methods for conductive or inductive charging via the vehicle underbody have been presented. In addition to manual parking of vehicles at the charging bay, autonomous parking functions will also be used in the future - for this reason, automatic charging systems have to be designed for both manual parking and self-parking vehicles. One important influencing factor on the system requirements of the automatic charging system and the correct function of the charging process has the positioning accuracy of the vehicle on the charging bay. In addition, standard connectors (e.g. according to IEC 62196) place high demands on the exact guidance of the connector system into the charging socket, which requires complex kinematic systems to execute the motion sequences.
The present work deals with the development of a robot-controlled charging system for the use of standardized charging couplings. The charging process takes place via the plug system without vehicle-side adaptations. In the course of an international research project, a charging robot has been developed and automatic charging was tested on different vehicle types. In this context, influencing factors of parking accuracy at the charging bay have been investigated on the basis of various test series. Subsequently, new findings regarding parking behaviour and vehicle positioning and their effects on automated charging processes were elaborated. The evaluation was supplemented by an analysis of studies of inductive charging systems. Finally, requirements for future automated conductive charging systems were elaborated to support the development of charging systems with standard connectors.